Luce - A Shoulder To Lean On
Of course the past year has been bad, especially for artists. The part that supports their livelihood the most has been taken away. Other people argue that hey, lockdown has been great for artists because they can just create their art without any distractions. Is it possible that both could be true? How brave it is then that an artist should release their debut single when their main tool to go out and support it has been taken away. Let me introduce you to singer and songwriter Luce with her new track ‘Shoulder’.
Originally from South Cambridgeshire, Luce has made a huge commitment to songwriting as she’s currently studying a Masters in just that at London’s Institute of Contemporary Music Performance. Luce turned the start of the pandemic to her advantage as she sought to learn the skills of home music production. Her Soundcloud showcases how diverse her taste in music is, from covers of Circa Waves, Taylor Swift, Muse, Christina Perri, and Sam Fender songs as well as early drafts of her own unreleased music. It was early January when Luce released her first single.
‘Shoulder’ begins with acoustic guitar, and is shortly followed by this tone-setting lyric; ‘You crushed me Monday evening when you said you’re feeling low.’ I’m reminded of Billie Marten in the acoustic guitar playing, but the comparison is fleeting. Initially I thought Shoulder would be more downbeat due to the opening words, but it’s more uplifting than that. The chorus lyric is lovely; ‘When you’re rolling up that boulder, and the mountains growing colder, I will be there, I’m your shoulder, to lean on.’ And can we talk about those harmonies? It’s done in such a way that it’s difficult to pick each one out entirely - the blend is simply that good.
Somewhere in there is a keyboard, it’s subtle, but it serves as a sonic bridge between the guitar and vocal to fill out that space. As well as that, electric guitar makes an appearance later on, which works very well with the chorus, lifting everything up further a notch. A surprise production move reduces all the frequencies down after this chorus and moves slowly bringing it all back in again, making the listener appreciate just how vibrant all those voices sound. All these arrangement decisions perfectly serve Shoulder to elevate it from being a single vocal and acoustic guitar piece to something worthy of radio air-play. Read on as Luce talks more about the production of Shoulder including the collaborators who helped put the track together, her musical inspirations, gigging, and her future endeavours.
1. Your debut single 'Shoulder' was co-written with David Boyden, what was it like to write together and where did the initial inspiration come from?
David and I were coursemates together on our Masters in Songwriting. He was taking on a project all about co-writing and got in touch with me. I think he asked me if anything was going on in my life at the time that I wanted to process, and I told him about a friend of mine who was having a difficult time with other friends of ours being shit [behaving poorly] to her and her mental health running on low. My friendship with her formed the inspiration of the song, and since both David and I were fans of Phoebe Bridgers and The Staves, we looked to those artists to guide us along the way.
2. I love all those vocal layers! Tell me about the recording of the track.
Thanks so much! I love me a juicy layering of vocals. I recorded the vocals from home, actually, with duvets pinned to the walls around me for sound absorption, a very DIY approach. Since I can remember I’ve been able to harmonise instantaneously, so I had to watch that I didn’t overdo it as you can easily drown out the main vocal melody. I think layering soft vocal tracks draws you in to the breath, as well, which was important in this song.
3. Guitars and Mastering on 'Shoulder' come from Thiago Trosso, how did you two meet and what led to him working on this track with you?
Thiago was also a course mate on my master’s at ICMP (NW London). We became good friends after co-writing on a couple of songs and found we had a great work ethic together. When it came to recording ‘Shoulder’, since I couldn’t play the acoustic guitar with the descending base notes and David didn’t have the equipment to record acoustically, we asked Thiago to record it from his home studio. Throughout the recording and producing, T guided me with his production knowledge, and since he is a multi-instrumentalist, he ended up recording most of the instruments in the arrangement as well.
4. The lyric video for 'Shoulder' is strangely hypnotic and relaxing, where did you shoot that footage?
I didn’t! It’s copyright-free footage from YouTube for motion background.
5. I saw you have a couple of Taylor Swift covers on your Soundcloud, what's been your favourite track from the 'folklore/evermore' period (apart from 'mirrorball')?
Ooooof… good question… it depends what mood I’m in. I love ‘right where you left me’ from evermore (deluxe) which I covered in my recent live streamed gig from home, but also am in awe of the lyric in ‘tolerate’ which is inspired by Du Maurier’s Rebecca.
6. Going further back, who were the artists that really inspired you to write your own music?
Well, we just mentioned one of them. I have always wanted to sing, as a kid I loved Avril Lavigne’s Let Go and Pink’s I’m Not Dead but it wasn’t until my late teens that I paid any interest in writing. I remember playing Kacey Musgraves’ Golden Hour in the car with my mum the summer before going to London for my post-grad, and the song ‘Happy & Sad’ was on. I was singing along loudly and then suddenly I was crying, overcome with a love for song writing. Hahahaha. So ridiculous, really. I think because I’d avoided pursuing music for a while - for fear of failing - I felt this immense relief that I’d finally given myself the freedom to do it.
7. Watching live gigs seems like a distant memory now. What was the last gig you went to?
Pffft. Yeah. How sad is that. My own, actually! March 10th I think, I played an indie gig in Kilburn with Thiago on kajon and my mate Sharne on guitar. Even then, lots of people were getting scared and staying home. I had tickets to see Circa Waves on the 2nd of April, hopefully they can reschedule that for some distant future.
Image Credit: @corarebel
8. There are some original tracks on your Soundcloud labelled as 'drafts', are more polished versions of those tracks coming in 2021?
The track ‘I’m With You’, which has now been retitled to ‘I Miss You’ is in consideration along with ‘Come Outside’ which is always enjoyed live. As for the rest of them, probably not. I’ve written a lot of alright songs, and I only really want to record and release the professionally crafted songs. Since I’m churning out a lot of material each week, it’s difficult to decide which songs to release.
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Follow the adventures of Luce across social media @lucebarks on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
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